Diapering Procedure

I've never worked at a center based daycare so I'm not very sure about what the official diapering procedure is when it came to child care.  I do daycare in my home so I don't have a Director or other staff member to assist with this so I asked a fellow family child care college of mine and she gave me the proper steps of the diapering procedure based on the Family Child Care Environment rating Scale standards.  So here we have it, the "quality" way of diapering.

 

Step 1

The first thing you do before starting the diaper procedure is to wash your hands using proper hand washing.

 

Step 2

Next get organized.  This will minimize the chances of contamination.  Get all of the diapering supplies you will need to change the child's diaper and place them near the diapering surface.

• Wipes.  Take enough out and have enough set aside to wipe the child's bum and to wipe the child's and your hands.  Wet diapers will need 3-4 wipes total, soiled diapers will need more. (wipes must be taken out of the container).
• A clean diaper.
• A dab of diaper cream on a paper towel/wax paper if using any.

Other things you can use to further prevent contamination:

• Extra clothes if the clothes that the child is wearing are soiled.
• Plastic bag for soiled clothing if you anticipate needing one.
• Non-porous gloves.
• Changing table paper to cover the surface from the child's shoulders to feet.

(Except for the changing table paper, place these items near the diapering surface but not directly on it.  For example, if you are using a changing table with a pad on it the items should be placed on the changing table and not directly onto the changing pad.)

 

Step 3

Put the gloves on and place the child on the diapering surface and remove the child's clothing to have access to the diaper.  If the clothes is soiled place them into the plastic bag.

 

Remove the diaper and throw it away into a lined, lidded, hands-free trash bin.  Using the wipes clean the child's diaper area from front to back (one wipe per swipe).  You can also simply open the diaper and leave it under the child during the wiping process then, once finished, the wipes can be put inside the soiled diaper and rolled up inside before throwing away.  If wearing gloves you can make a "diaper bomb" by holding the tightly rolled soiled diaper in one hand and with the other gloved hand taking the outside cuff of the first glove and pulling it down and over the diaper.  Then take the soiled diaper in your other hand and pull your other hand completely out of the glove.  With your ungloved hand take the cuff of your gloved hand and pull down and over the diaper in the same way.  You are now holding an encased diaper and can throw that away. 

 

Step 4

Take a wipe and wipe your hands and throw that wipe away.  Take another wipe and wipe the child's hands and throw that wipe away as well.  Put a clean diaper on and apply diaper cream if needed, throw the paper towel/wax paper away.  Dress the child.

 

Wash the child's hands in the sink using proper hand washing procedures and then release the child to continue play.

 

Roll/fold up the changing table paper with the side that the child laid on in the inside and throw it away. 

 

Step 5

Spray the diaper changing area with a soapy water solution and dry it with a paper towel. 

 

Disinfect the diaper changing area by spraying the surface with an approved disinfectant.  Let the solution sit for 2 minutes then wipe dry (or allow to air dry).

 

Wash your hands using proper hand washing procedures.

Probing Questions to Support Concept Development

Intentionality

I took a workshop on supporting children with intentional teaching.  It was a wonderful class and I came away with a lot of useful information.  The focus of the workshop was to give ideas on how to encourage children’s scientific inquiry skills by allowing them to observe, question, seek their own answers to problems, evaluate, develop mental relationships, having conversations about discoveries, developing theories and documentation.

At first it seems like it’s easier said than done but a lot of this can be done through conversation and open ended questions.  Open ended questions have no right or wrong answer.  This way of asking questions stimulates language use, teaches that there are more ways than one way to solve a problem, affirms children's ideas and encourages creative thinking.  Here is a list of open ended questions and responses that will help you support children's concept development.

• Tell me your idea.
• What does it look like?
• Tell me how you did that.
• What does it feel like?
• What do you wish would happen?
• What can you do next time?
• What is happening?
• What can you tell me about it?
• What's another way you might .....?
• Which one do you have more of?
• How do you think you can find out?
• Is one larger or smaller than another?  Or is it the same?
• What would it look like if .....?
• What do you call the things that you are using?
• What else can you do or use?
• How are you going to do that?
• When did you do that before?
• What will you do next after you finish that?
• What did you see?
• How do you know?
• Why did you decide to use ..... instead of .....?
• What is it made of?
• What do you think the problem is?
• Show me what you could do with it.
• How did you conclude that?
• Can you think of another way you can do this?
• What is the connection between ..... and .....?
• What do you think you could do next?
• What is the problem?
• Why is it a problem?
• I see that you .....
• What does this make you think of?
• I noticed that ..... happened.
• In what ways are these different?
• In what ways are they the same?
• What would happen if .... ?
• What materials did you use?
• What do you notice about .....?
• What might you try instead?
• How are you going to do that?
• Tell me about your .....
• What can you do to fix it?

These open-ended questions can be written on sentence strips and placed high up on a wall or the complete list can be placed on a clipboard and hung somewhere that is easily seen and referenced.  Doing this helped me get used to the questions and gave me ideas to use when working with the children. 

Promoting Your Website

Get The Word Out

So you made a website, great!  And now you're done right?  Not exactly.  You see people aren't going to see your website unless you promote it.  Now that doesn't have to be a hard thing to do, in fact some things you can do are pretty easy.  Here are a few things you can do to promote your website and get it seen by potential clients.  

Business Cards

Always carry your business cards with you and always include your website on your business cards.  You can only put so much information on your business cards and by adding your website address you give people a way to learn more about your daycare.  I always carry a ton of cards with me and here's a little trick that I do.  When I'm anywhere talking to anyone about anything and they ask me for something that I could write down like a recipe, an address, someone else's phone number, you name it, I write it on the back of my card. 

I can be talking to a stranger at the supermarket and they can ask me about where I got my son's awesome mustache pacifier (really, it happened) and they will get my card with ...

"Mustache pacifier

Amazon

$2.99"

 ... written on the back of it.  Hand your cards to EVERYONE.  

Craigslist

I know a lot of providers that shy away from using Craigslist for one reason or another.  For me Craigslist has been the best source for traffic to my website and calls from potential clients so I advocate it.  Yes it has its' issues but if you create an ad that looks well, stands out and is interesting you can lead a lot of interest to your website which can translate to new clients.

I order to maximize your Craigslist make sure to create an ad under the appropriate area which is the Community Section in Childcare.  I suggest against placing ads in other areas such as the For Sale area for Baby & Kid and Toys & Games.  I understand the logic the providers have when they do this - parents with children are looking at these ads - but I can't tell you enough how annoyed people get when they see ads that aren't categorized correctly, you'll probably get your add flagged.  

Your ad itself should be brief with enough information about your daycare to get parents to want to look at your website.  State your general area (such as the part of town), the openings you're hoping to fill as well as the age of the child(ren) that the opening is for.  Invite parents to call or respond to the ad if they want more information or to schedule an interview and close with a very brief description of your program.  Then add a link that directs parents to your website.  CA providers, don't forget to add your license number. 

Also I add a map showing my closest cross street.  Parents often base their chose on convenience and are looking for child care in a specific area so if you can give them an idea as to where your daycare home is you have a better chance of attracting those clients. 

I personally create a flyer (I used Photoshop but other programs work also) and use HTML to add it to my add.  My flyer is organized, colorful and gives quick bursts of information (I apologize in advance for the lousy screen shot).

Lastly I add photos.  ALWAYS ADD PHOTOS!  I cannot begin to tell you how boring ads are without them and you need to set yourself apart from the other ads.  If you don't feel comfortable using photos of the daycare children you can always use photos where their faces don't show or use photos of your space.  It really helps.

E-mail Signature

What is an e-mail signature?  A signature is a block of text that automatically gets added to the bottom of an e-mail message.  It can be your name, a quote etc.  By creating a signature in your emails you are giving everyone that you communicate through e-mail with a link that takes them right to your website.  

Your signature should have your name, your title, your daycare name, a link to your website, email address and license number (CA FCC is required to add the license number to all advertising).  You can also add your telephone number and address if you wish.  Here's an example:

Marina Valenzuela
Child Care Provider
Helping Hands Childcare, Licensed Family Child Care Home
MyHelpingHandsChildcare.webs.com 
HelpingHands@Daycare.com
(805) 555-6860
License #:566123456

The actual process of creating a signature in your e-mail depends on your e-mail provider.  A quick Google search for "how do I add a signature in [AOL, GMAIL, etc.] will direct you with step by step instructions.

Start a Blog

If you've been at this daycare thing for a while then you've probably picked up a good trick here and there so why not share it with other like-minded people and add a link to your website.  Write about your daily life as a family child care provider, if you have awesome administrative skills write about creating contracts and documents, if you have an amazing preschool curriculum share activities with parents and clients alike.  

The traffic from these blogs can create more traffic to your website. 

E-Newsletters

Some providers create paper newsletters for their clients with updates and other information so why not e-mail them newsletters as well.  E-mailed newsletters have a chance of having a parent forward them to someone else especially if they want to show off what an awesome provider they have. Include recipes or instructions for activities that you did at daycare for parents to try at home and include color photos of the children while they are being done and you're golden.  If the parents have friends or family with children around the same age they may share the newsletters with them. (pictures don't have to include the children's faces and can be of the neck down or of their hands making the activity).  

I use Target Hero which is free and easy to use.  

Submit Your Site to Search Engines

Although most times when you create a website it is automatically added to search listings it can sometimes take months and your ranking in the search results may be very low.  You can manually add your website to search engines which can be a lot faster than waiting for search engines to automatically add you however it can still take as long as four weeks even if you manually add your website.  By manually adding your website and updating it often you can increase your chances of people seeing it in search results.

Google - Google Webmaster Tools for submitting your website manually.  Just copy and paste your website address and type it in the URL box, type the words that appear in the Captcha and hit Submit Request.  

Yahoo!/Bing - Bing Toolbox to submit your site.  Yahoo search is powered by Bing so if you submit your website to Bing's search engine it will automatically add it to Yahoo!'s as well.  Just like Google's, type in your website URL, fill out the Captcha box and hit Submit. 

Remember, no one thing will in itself get you amazing results but combining many strategies together and consistency will.  

How To Advertise Your Daycare

Advertising

(Editor's Note: I am a member of the Daycare.com Forum and in one thread the topic of marketing your daycare came up. The following was my response to that thread which I decided to post here as well.  The owner of Daycare.com asked if I would allow my response to be used as an article on his site, I of course agreed.  You can find that article here.)

 

The best way to promote your business is to understand there is not one way that is going to work. You have to use several different means. I network with a lot of child care providers that always ask me how I do so well when the odds are stacked against me. I live in a condo, I have a small patio, I don't have a lot of indoor or outdoor [daycare] space, I don't have as much experience in providing child care in my home as other providers, I have even less experience in licensed child care, I don't have a degree in child development (which many child care provider's in my area now do), I'm young and look even younger so people don't always take me seriously etc. but I have as many clients as I want and still get calls even when I'm not advertising or looking for new clients. The key is to get your name out there as much as you possibly can. Sooner or later the work will be done for you.

Flyers and printed materials are great if you post them in businesses that are somehow related to children (pediatricians, children hairstylists, child dentists etc.) so you can ask them if you can leave your flyer or business cards in their office.  Return the favor and take back some of their business cards and printed material to pass out to the parents. For dentists it works if they give you "goody bags" with toothbrushes that have the dentist's name on them and a business card in the bag. My families love it when I pass the bags out. Gas stations, parks and schools are also great places to post flyers but make sure you check your city ordinances and always make sure to get permission to post them first. Here are more ideas for advertising your daycare.

1) Create ads EVERYWHERE (online) with your contact info and a link to your [website]. There's tons of places online that help you create at least a basic ad for free. Craigslist, eBay classifieds, Sales   Spider, Angie's List, Care.com, Yahoo! Classifieds, Yellow Pages, Google Local, iNetGiant, and of course Daycare.com.

 

2) Talk to EVERYBODY about your daycare ALL OF THE TIME. Shamelessly plug your daycare in everyday conversations no matter who you're talking to or where your are. Example: Grocery store and the woman at the check stand comments about something you are purchasing, you say "Oh yeah, I HAD to get that. My daycare kids love it". I've commented about my daycare to the checkers at my grocery store so much that other employees now will walk by me and say "Hi ____, shopping for good stuff for the daycare again I see" and then other people in the aisle now know that I do daycare. Happens all of the time at the dentist, at my doctor's office, at a restaurant, you name it. Even my friends and ex-coworkers regularly promote my daycare and send me referrals (just make sure that you at least send a thank you note to show your appreciation when someone sends you a referral). And be EXCITED and PASSIONATE when talking about your business. Make people feel about your daycare how you feel about it.

 

3) Post Your Location. I know a lot of [other family child care providers] don't like to post their addresses on their advertising however I just don't think it's business-wise. I added my daycare on Google Maps so that when people Googled "child care" in this area I'd pop up. This generation of parents are younger and use the internet to find businesses in their area including child care so take advantage of that. I had a woman call me last week and I offered to refer her to other providers that I knew that had openings. I gave her names and general areas of the other providers (all within a mile of me) and she said that she had seen them in her   Google search but called me because she immediately knew that my location would work for her. She actually told me that she wished that other [family] daycares would do that because it would make it a lot easier to find a daycare in the area that she needed. And don't stop at Google, add your daycare to Yahoo!   Business listings and other major search engine directories. A basic listing is free but you have to list your address (no PO boxes). If you have a website you can link [your site] to your directory listing too.

4) Have a website. If you don't have one yet, get one. You don't have to get all fancy but make it look organized and clean. You can create one easily and for free if you use sites like wix.com or weebly.com. Put a lot of useful information on it like your hours, contact information, information about you, your program and your equipment/toys etc. Whatever the people ask you about most during interviews should be on the website. Put your contract and policies on it so that parents can read them in advance. Update your website frequently. Updating it pushes you up higher in search engine searches, if you don't update it regularly search engines like Google will put you lower in search listings because they want people to find websites with the most relevant and up to date information as possible. Make the information stuff that people want to read. You can even make a section for parents only where they can view photos, see a calendar etc. The more people that view your website the higher the listing you get in search engines.

5) Submit your website URL to Google, Yahoo!, Bing, Ucanto, Self Promote, Addpro, Free Site Submission, Quick Register etc. Otherwise it can take FOREVER for your website to be added to the search listings or you can be placed really low on the list.

6) Offer incentives to your current clients. Give them $50-$100 off of a weeks' tuition if they refer someone that signs up and stays for at least 4 weeks. Give your clients a reason to want to refer you to others that will benefit them.

7) Meet and network with other [family child care] providers near you and stay in touch about what openings they have. Offer to refer clients to them if you get a call for a child that you can't take and vice versa. For example if you have an opening for an infant but don't offer SA care and another provider doesn't do infant care but offers SA care you could refer clients to each other.

All in all this is just some of the things that you can do to promote your business, there are tons of other ways to do it but like I said, it's a combination of things that really works and not just one thing alone!

Creating a Daycare Website Part 2

What To Put In It

In this second part of the Creating a Daycare Website series I'm going to get down to the "meat & potatoes" ... what a daycare website should have.  For the purposes of this "how-to" we are making a simple yet functional website to help you get started.  In part one I gave a quick and general overview of how the Webs Sitebuilder works and now we are going to just talk about what pages and information a website should have.  

From my experience I have found that all you need is five basis pages for your daycare website.  A Home page, About Us page, a Program page, a Parent page and a Contact Us page.  These pages can make up your basic site but give you the flexibility to add sub-pages later in the future.

Home Page

Your home page should be an introduction page to your business with a general description about your daycare.  I would include what type of daycare you have (large/small, family child care etc.), a general location of your daycare home to give parents an idea of where you are located, whether you are close to any major streets or freeways/highways, what type of care you provide (full-time, part-time, drop-in, weekends, evenings, overnights, after-school etc.), and a quick overview of what type of program you provide (care only, relaxed, structured, curriculum, play-based, educational etc.).  

I personally like to be very convenient for parents so I like to also include whether I have openings or not right on my home page so that they don't have to call or go fishing through the other pages to find this information.

Add a few colorful photos of your daycare children playing/doing crafts or of your space and voila!  Now let me say something about photos.  There are lots of providers that don't like posting photos of children for safety reasons ... totally understandable.  That being said, you don't have to post photos that show a children's faces.  Posting pictures that only show the back's of children work just as well without compromising the safety of the children and they look way better than any website or advertising that has no photos at all or that has generic photos of children taken from the internet.  Photos of children from the neck down or of the child's hands while they make a craft also look wonderful and really show parents what their child could be doing at your daycare.  

About Us Page

I like to say that the About Us page is both a history report and a resume for both the provider and the daycare.  Well ... at least that's how I like to use this page.

Add location and license information such as major cross streets, schools and parks nearby, major highways and freeways, license type, ratio limit and type of child care you provide.  This section will repeat a lot of the information you gave on your Home page except here you should give more detail.  

You should also take the time to write a mission statement and child care philosophy and add those to this page.  This will help parents get an idea of what to expect from your care.  

It is also a great idea to add a section about you as a provider.  Add things that are relevant to daycare such as how you got started, why you chose to do daycare, your experience in child care, education, training etc.  One thing that I do is actually make a resume for potential clients as well as a full list of training and education that I've completed and I save a PDF copy and add them to this section for them to download.

Program Page

Use this page to describe the day to day things about your daycare such as your approach to learning, your daily schedule or routine, curriculum etc.  Do you run a laid-back flexible program, a structured more rigid program, or something in between?  Do you follow a daily schedule for meals and activities or have a particular routine for the children?  What type of activities do you do with the children?  Do you take them on field trips?  Do the children tale walks or ride in a vehicle to get to places?  What type of meals do you serve to the children?  These are all important things to mention in this section.  I suggest adding a sample of your schedule/routine and meal plans to this page so that parents get a glimpse into a typical day in your daycare. 

Parent Page

This page is for both enrolled and potential clients alike.  Add special reminders or upcoming dates, photos, a wish-list of items that you would love to have donated to your daycare, enrollment information and other information that you think is important for parents to know.  

Other suggestions are to have your rates, contract and policies posted right here as well.  Doing so can save you time interviewing clients that aren't a good fit for your program.  Parents can see this information from the start and decide whether to keep looking or to give you a call for more information.  My recommendation if you add these to your site add links to downloadable PDF versions of these documents so that your page isn't forever long. 

Contact Us Page

This page should be much simpler than any of the other pages and can just have your daycare name, license number, contact name, hours of operation, telephone number, e-mail, and if possible a contact form that parents can fill out online.  

In General

Keep your website updated and change it often.  This will get you better search engine rankings.  I also strongly suggest that you add photos of your daycare space and of the children playing or doing activities while in your care. Use font styles and colors that are easy to read and please, please, please ... watch your spelling, grammar and punctuation.  If you use Google Chrome to edit your website it will catch spelling errors for you, otherwise you can simply use a word processor program like Microsoft Word to type out your content, use spellcheck and then copy and paste the corrected content to your website.  

If you missed Part 1 of this 2 part series you can check it out.  It gives a step by step walk through of the basics of creating a new Webs site and using the tools. 

Creating a Daycare Website Part 1

Using Webs.com

One of the best advertising strategies that I use is my daycare website.  I include my website address on all of my advertising and constantly change and update my website.  This helps keep the information on my site relevant, fresh and interesting.  It also helps me get a higher ranking when people search for daycare online.  Let's face it, we are in the internet age where consumers turn to the internet first to find and research products and services. Having a website that is informative and accessible creates a lot of leads for potential clients.  

For some that feel they are not savvy or simply don't know where to start I will create a step by step lesson on how to create a simple starter website using the free web page service from Webs.com.  I am most familiar with this web design tool and feel that it is easy for even the least technology literate users.  You can make up to 10 pages for your site for free.  

*I should mention that the web designer works best with Google Chrome so make sure to have it installed and use this browser when creating or making changes to your website.

Getting Started

The first thing you will want to do is go to Webs.com and sign up for your free account.  Once you're signed up and signed in click on Add a New Site.      

Pick a site title relevant to your daycare.  This should be the name of your daycare such as "Valenzuela Family Child Care" or "Helping Hands Childcare", depending on what is on your license.  Now pick your Site Category which should be Education & Children (you'll see child care listed to the right of it).  

Next pick a template theme. Don't worry, you can change it later without disturbing your content if you don't like it or change your mind (I chose Crafty).  

Now choose which pages you want to start off with.  I like to start with nothing and add to it as I go so for now let's just leave the Home page selected and deselect the others.  Don't forget to click the little box at the bottom that says Agree To The Terms of Service and click the Create My Website button.  

This next step is where you pick your domain name.  That's what your website address is going to be.  If you pick something pretty generic you'll probably have to play with it a bit until you get a URL address that's available but if you've stuck with something more unique you'll have better luck.  Whatever name you choose it will have webs.com after it.  Once you're done click the green button to generate your bare bones website.  

Setting Up Your Foundation

Before you can do anything else a screen with a 3-minute tutorial video will pop up.  I recommend you watch it since it talks about different parts of the Webs SiteBuilder.  Click on the X and now you can start creating your website.

Near the bottom of your screen you'll notice boxes, these are your tools called Modules.  I'm not going to spend any time explaining them because they're all pretty much self explanatory.  I will address them as I go and as I need them.  

Next look up near the top of the screen.  Next to Builder is Theme.  Click on that and there you can change the theme, colors & fonts and background.  Any changes here will be applied to your entire website.  Click on the Colors & Fonts tab.  For now the only thing I will change is the font style so click on Body and change your Text and Titles to the font of your liking.  I chose Architects Daughter for the titles and Coming Soon for the text.  When you are done click the green Apply button near the bottom and then Return to Builder.

Learning How to Edit Your Pages

Now that you have your website set up it's time to start adding content.  I personally like my home page looking a little less simple and so I want to change the layout.  Look near the top of the screen and you'll notice a little cog with a tiny arrow under it next to the magnifying glass.  That's your drop down Settings menu.  Click on Change Page Layout.  A pop-up window will open up with  different layouts.  Choose a layout that you like and click Save Layout. 

Okay, so I chose the Banner Sidebar Left layout and now I can really get started.  I like having any openings that I have available to show right on my home page so I will use the left side of the top banner for that.  Just click on the text and start typing to change the content.  

On the right the layout that I chose automatically added a slideshow so I will double click where it says Double Click to Add an Image :P.  Double click again to add an image and you can upload a photo in the My Images tab.  If you have a Photobucket account you can upload a lot more photos there and then click on the Image URL tab and enter your photo's direct URL from Photobucket (this is what I do).  Select your photo and then you can zoom in and out and move the photo around.  Once your photo is just where you like it click on the box with the + in it to add another photo and repeat the steps above until you are satisfied with your slideshow.  Once you are done click the green box with the check mark. 

So now we get to use those Modules near the bottom of the SiteBuilder.  It's all drag and drop so it's pretty easy.  Let's start by adding a brief description to the Home page.  Left click on the Text module and drag it onto any lighted area of your page.  Now you just click on that module and start typing your description.  

Next let's add a title over the description.  Drag and drop a Title module right above the description.  When you hold the new module in this area you will see a blue line.  This line represents where the module will be added.  If the blue line falls on the left of the text box then that is where it will be added, if it appears under it then that is where it be added etc.  Drop it above the text box and type your title.  

Use the other modules to add more content to your page in the same manner.

Creating a New Page

Remember that cog from earlier?  It's that little symbol next to the magnifying glass near the upper right hand of the SiteBuilder.  Click on it and select Create a New Page then select the type of format you want for your new page (I picked Sidebar Left) and type in the title of your new page and click Create a Page. 

And that is pretty much how you use the modules and other SiteBuilder tools to create a website.  Now that you are somewhat familiar with the Webs SiteBuilder you can move on to Part 2.

If there is something in Webs SiteBuilder that you don't understand or don't know how to do please feel free to contact me at HelpingHands@Daycare.com and I will add it to this post.  Thanks!

Daycare.com Forum

My Support Group

I just had to talk about this great website that I found that has helped me out tremendously.  Daycare.com is in itself a great resource and has articles about a huge variety of daycare subjects but what I personally enjoy most about the site is its Daycare Forum.  

If you have a question about anything relating to daycare someone there will be willing to share their experiences and recommendations.  An absolutely awesome thing about the forum is its' tax section.  Tom Copeland himself often chimes in with his own professional opinion!  Who doesn't want his help for free???  (if you don't know who Tom is: he's the guru of daycare taxes).  

If you ever need business support check the forum out.